CNN’s Manu Rajucaught up with Hatch late Monday afternoon and asked Utah’s senior senator about the Friday news that prosecutors in the Southern District of New York (SDNY) had determined Trump directed his longtime attorney and fixer Michael Cohen to commit campaign finance violations. Hatch was unshaken.

“The Democrats will do anything to hurt this president,” the long-serving senator said.

Being told the allegation came from SDNY prosecutors and had nothing to do with Democrats had no apparent impact on Hatch's opinion.

That ongoing investigation is being undertaken by career prosecutors in the Manhattan U.S. Attorneys office–an office currently controlled by a Republican appointee who was installed by President Trump himself. This information was relayed to Hatch. He was still unmoved.

“Okay but I don’t care; all I can say is he’s doing a good job as President,” the octogenarian former boxer said.

Hatch went on:

“I don’t think he was involved in crimes but even then, you know, you can make anything a crime under the current laws; if you want to you can blow it way out of proportion–you can do a lot of things.”

…

“President Trump before he became president that’s another world,” the one-time chicken coop-dweller said. “Since he’s become president this economy has charged ahead…And I think we ought to judge him on that basis other than trying to drum up things from the past that may or may not be true.”